As I stagger towards the finish of #The100DayProject I am grasping for topics to write about. I had pretty much settled on forming a few paragraphs to describe the fungus I dug out from under my toenails when a better idea landed in my brain: food. Not sure how I went from fungus to food, but let's all thank our deity of choice that I did. I've mentioned more than once that I enjoy cooking....it wasn't too long ago I wrote a post about making jam.....prior to that I wrote about canning and freezing foods......geez, maybe I've overdone it with food prose. Nah.
I love pizza. Don't have a favorite kind, don't have a least favorite kind, don't have preferred or dismissed toppings - just give me a slice and stay out of my way so I can eat it. Folks will ask what I want on my pizza, and I just reply it doesn't matter 'cause you could throw dog poop on a pizza and I'd eat it. They laugh at my funny joke until the serious look on my face tells them I'm not joking, that I really would eat dog poop pizza. They then quickly order and spend the rest of the meal shifting awkwardly in their seats while sending worried glances my direction. Pizza is not a laughing matter.
I've discovered, though, that I enjoy creating pizza almost...almost...as much as I enjoy eating it. And because my pizza creations have become pretty darn good, pizza night at my house is a win-win for dad! My daughters have named my creations Papa Daddy's Pizzas, and they too get as excited as I when they smell a from-scratch crust dough rising in my bread machine.
That's step number one for creating a top-notch pizza: my crust. It's also the easiest step - throw some olive oil, flour, salt, and yeast in the bread pan and let the bread machine do the work. I do a bit more, though, to make sure my crust is perfect. First I add some Italian seasoning and garlic powder. The seasoning becomes noticeable in the finished crust, making it look like it should taste better than a plain crust. The garlic powder gives the crust a warm aroma as it rises, building anticipation for the finished product. Getting the crust to rise a little before baking is a crucial part of the pizza process, and it's taken me a while to get that part right. But a warm oven and a dish towel for the right amount of time now give me a soft, fluffy crust every time.
Once the crust is done the fun begins when the toppings come out. I suppose about half the pizzas I make are the standard pepperoni or veggie variety, but I love trying different topping combinations. Tonight I experimented with two pizzas and came up with one winner and one that was decent enough to be added to my menu. The decent pizza was chicken-bacon-parmesan (I bought a bottle of parmesan spice blend stuff while in Indiana, so I sprinkled a layer on the toppings before adding cheese) with a little bit of chopped onion on traditional red pizza sauce and topped with mozzarella cheese. The winning combo was a pulled pig pizza; pulled pork, bacon, and chopped onion on a thin smear of BBQ sauce and topped with Monterey Jack cheese. Hang on, my mouth is watering...
So what makes my pizzas so tasty? Well, I've started adding onion to almost every pizza I make, but not too much. I want the onion to whisper in the background of the toppings flavors, not stomp all over them. I chop the pieces small and spread them conservatively. I've also started using about half as much cheese as I used to.....about four ounces per pizza. My daughters aren't totally on board with this but eight ounces of cheese does three things: 1) drowns the rest of the toppings, 2) makes the crust soggier, and 3) adds inches to my waistline. Not to mention cheese is getting expensive.
I grill the pizza every time during the months that aren't below freezing. I set the pizza pan on a deep aluminum baking pan so it's up off the grill grates, that way the crust doesn't burn while the warm smokey air circulates around the pizza. The taste difference between oven baked and grilled pizzas is subtle but it's there....and it's fabulous. I've also become bolder with my toppings experiments, and made mental notes on what works and what might work better. For instance, we all loved the pulled pig pizza, but I've got an idea for the next one that might be even better....cream cheese. Dang, mouth water again.
Yup, I love me a good pizza....and I love making my own good pizzas. Just like my jams and jellies and other preserves it's taken a lot of trial and error to get my pizza creating methods perfected, or nearly perfected. Luckily there's no such thing as "bad" pizza, so even my experiments are edible and enjoyable. Sure, pizzas aren't the healthiest food I create, but by making them from scratch I can keep them a little healthier than frozen or restaurant varieties. Plus, mine come with one additional ingredient: mine are always topped with love. Unless someone grabs the piece that I wanted. Friends and family become nothing more than enemies once the pizza gets sliced. Why do you think I'm joking? Pizza is no laughing matter.
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